Pazukhin, N.M.: In the Jaws of a Crocodile

Title

V pasti krokodila. Rasskaz iz zhizni puteshestvii po Afrike, Moskva 1894 (first edition: 1889)

In the Jaws of a Crocodile

Keywords

Summary

The book narrates the adventures of two men, who, after a casual meeting, decide to travel together to Africa, crossing the Black Sea. One of them, David Begash, comes from Little Russia, while the other, Magul, is a Circassian; both, however, have previously lived in Africa, Begash for three years, while Magul for seventeen. Moreover, both are said to have had positive encounters with the local population: Begash was on the verge of marrying a local girl (though her parents refused), while Magul recalls that he was considered a friend and brother by the Africans. Once in Africa, the two men devote themselves to hunting along the banks of the Nile. They soon become involved with an American family, saving the young daughter Louisa from a tiger and thus unleashing the jealousy of her cousin, who is in love with her. While looking for a bird to present to Louisa, Begash ends up in a crocodile’s mouth, but he is saved by Magul.

Bio

Nikolai Pazukhin was a lubochnyi writer and the brother of the writer Aleksei Pazukhin. His earliest identified publication is the short story The Terrible Night (1883), which already exhibited features characteristic of many of Pazukhin’s subsequent works, such as a craving for adventure and the depiction of violent passions, horrors, murders, and exoticism. Some of his most successful works include The Murder of a Millionaire by the Robber Churkin (1884), Buried Alive (1892), The Mystery of the Torn Grave, and The Black Skull, or Mysterious Crime (1894). Pazukhin also authored historical novels, such as Ermak, Conqueror of Siberia (1885), and Ataman Kirsha (1888). Additionally, he often reworked well-known classics, including those by Aleksei Tolstoi and Mikhail Lermontov. According to a review (1889) by fellow writer, bibliographer and pedagogue Nikolai Rubakin, In the Jaws of a Crocodile “amazes the reader with horrific scenes, impossible adventures, unbelievable absurdities and unbridled imagination”.

Sources

A. Reitblat, “Pazukhin, Nikolai Mikhailovich”, in Russkie pisateli. 1800-1917: Biograficheskii slovar’, t. 4, ed. by P. Nikolaev, Moskva 1999, p. 505-506;

A. Kuprin, Polnoe sobranie sochinenii v 10 tomakh: Rasskazy, ocherki, pamflet, Zametki publitsista, satirika i literaturnogo kritika, t. 9, Moskva 2007, p. 516.

A.F., M.E.